Blueberry Picking
by tigerpawpad
Summary: AU. Sequel to Beach Day but can be read separately. Cas and Dean take a weekend vacation and have different ideas how to spend it.


Dean's tongue felt dry and gritty. The back of his neck was on fire and his shoulders ached. His knees were starting to bruise from kneeling on the rocky ground carefully around thorny bushes and moose droppings. The tips of his fingers were slowly turning a purplish-blue as he picked one ripe, juicy blueberry after another.

"They love rocky, sunny areas," Cas read from his giant plant book that morning, "That loud southern lady at the front desk said Magnetic Rock trail would be the best for berry picking." Dean grunted in reply, which ended up in him getting a hard slap on his butt but a few more minutes of laying in the cool sheets. Cas was busy slurping coffee and re-packing his pack, this time with more snacks and maps. Dean finally got up when Cas pushed a cup of coffee in his face. Dean grunted and stretched his way to the bathroom to take a leak. He checked out the growth on his face and deemed the rough stubble acceptable for a day on the trail. Outside the door Dean heard his cell phone chime and Cas pick up, "Hey, Sam." Dean left the bathroom and rushed towards Cas and yanked the phone away from his ear, "Hey, Sammy! How goes it? Did you get the gig?"

"Yeah, Dean, I got it."

"Good, that's good, that's really good man, I wish we had been there to celebrate."

"Yeah, me too, but Bobby and the gang pretty much covered that."

"I knew you were going to kick that interview's ass."

"Dean, it's really not that big of a deal it's just a starting position at a small law firm, I'll probably just be getting people's coffee for the first week."

"Yeah right! No one sends my baby brother for coffee, with all your smarts you'll have those bitches begging you to run their firm." Sam laughed, "What are you and Cas doing today?"

"Uh, going moose hunting, right Cas?" Cas glared at Dean and grabbed the phone out of his hand, "No, we're not," Cas said loudly into the receiver, "We're going blueberry picking."

Dean grabbed the phone back and quickly shut it down, "Great, now he will never shut up, you've created a monster." Dean's phone beeped.

_Whipped._ Dean threw the phone onto the bed in the mess of blankets and sheets.

Dean knew he was whipped when he took the basket Cas gave him, which was more like a five pound bucket. They walked for about a mile through the rough terrain before they found any berries. The trees shaded the meandering path nicely until they got to the river. They had to leap across a few stones and balance across a log but they made it to the the other side. The landscape changed then to low, yellow grasses among jagged slabs of gunflint rock. The path continued up the hill and looped around a few boulders and started to get steeper. The sun made its usual way across the sky and by the time Cas scoped out a blueberry patch it was high above them.

"It's such a beautiful day!" Cas was coming back down the path carrying his bucket full of berries. Dean wiped the sweat from his brow and leaned his tired self onto a mossy rock. Cas came up to him and set his bucket down on the dusty ground.

"How do you have so many berries?" Dean looked from Cas' full bucket of big, round berries to his half-full one of little black berries and bruised purple ones.

"How do you have so few?" Cas teased. Dean rolled his eyes and wiped berry juice on Cas' jeans.

"Uh, Dean, some of these aren't blueberries." Cas held a handful from Dean's bucket in his open palm and inspected them, "these black ones with the stem shaped like a star? They're juneberries, and they might kill you." Cas threw it on the ground. "But these other purple ones are huckleberries and they're delicious," he popped it into his mouth. "What have you been doing, eating them all?"

Dean was offended, "I've been picking blueberries!" Cas grinned wide and stepped over his bucket and into Dean's personal space. He straddled Dean, lifted up his damp t-shirt and lightly pinched his sides. Dean relaxed and looked up at the halo of gold that shone around ruffled brown hair, "I picked them all for you, Cas, so you can do hell knows what with them." Cas pinched his ribs, harder, "I'm going to make you a hundred berry pies."


End file.
